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Contests?

Who would be in favor of some type of monthly contest?

Comments

I think the contest will make a good challange among the participants on this site. I wish everyone will vote for or against this idea, so we, the AC members would work on more the idea.
Also it would be great if any ideas concerning the contest are added.
We appreciate everyones' thoughts and ideas.

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I know we've already discussed this in the AC. Hopefully we'll get a bit more feedback or we'll just have to assume this idea is a dud lol.............stan

author comment

When I was Chair the competitions went really well I for one would vote for their return I couldn't enter back then I was a judge LOL !!

love JC xxx

“The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.” — W.B. Yeats

I expect if implemented the judges as well as AC would be barred from entering in order to avoid any appearance of favoritism. But if we don't get much more response to this bog I guess we will have to assume there is little interest in contests.......stan

author comment

Sharing my thoughts. A contest almost always brings out the best amongst contestants. I believe few will argue against this. Yet, it would perhaps help if it was put to vote in an objective manner rather than a subjective manner. The first step has already been initiated by Stan in the form of his Blog to tickle our minds, obviously in an attempt to know the pulse of the Members,

For an objective evaluation I propose we carry out a SWOT on this proposal of dear friend Stan. I am quite sure most of us are aware about what SWOT is. For those who may not be aware, it simply is a tool to determine all perspectives. SWOT in essence is a paraphrase for

S trengths
W eaknesses
O pportunities
T hreats

I suggest each one of us enters their opinion against each of the 4 parameters above, over a time line to be decided by Stan, at the end of which it would enable us to have a collective opinion, whereby we re-start the Contests fully aware about all possible consequences. Purely for example sake (not my own) I am entering some possible opinions which members may want to add. They can enter their name brackets after typing their opinion against each element of S W O T

Strengths:
1, Competitive spirit could bring out the best (raj)

Weaknesses:
1. Grading competencies of participants for a level playing field (raj)

Opportunities::
1.Will promote continual improvement 2. Sharpen abilities to relate poem with contest theme (raj)

Threats:
1. Members may complain of Bias (raj) 2. Getting Unanimous approval for panel (raj)

regards,

raj (sublime_ocean)

i agree that the judging would likely be the hardest part of a contest. I tend to want the poems judged by the general membership instead of the AC. We can't depend of a general vote as that could well turn the contest into a popularity contest as happened with the "Spotlight" on the old site. I think perhaps a 3-5 person panel appointed by the AC which would periodically change, maybe every other month or so.............stan PS personally i think the vote would be majority as opposed to unanamous. It's hard to get over 2 people to agree on anything lol

author comment

You are spot on. The fundamental need for any contest is to be open minded and trust the judges/referees/umpires and participate with an open mind. I put up the idea of a SWOT as one of the tools to have objective feed back on having a Contest. I have already backed the idea. Hope there is no misunderstanding...regards..

raj (sublime_ocean)

No misunderstanding. I have been SWOTting for years and never knew it lol..........stan

author comment

It's about time that we all put up or shut up as to how good we think we really are, poetry-wise! I'm all for it!

I hope if we do this it will be in the spirit of fun. And just because somebody might not win a particular contest won't mean they're not good, just that in that particular contest somebody else is a bit better............stan

author comment

Do ya'll think the contests should each have a theme or have each contest open to all types of poetry and any subject?

author comment

My Opinion:-

1. Theme should be common to all participants
2. Contestants should be allowed the choice of poetry type- free verse, structured westerm. structured Eastern or any other
3. The contest period should be open for at least one month, to give participants sufficient time
4. To eliminate possibility of the contestant's post not being copied/used by others, a date may be submitted for submission

raj (sublime_ocean)

I'm not too sure about 3rd suggestion. I have actually been considering a one week entry period for a couple of reasons 1. It would limit the number of entries and thus keep judges from being overwhelmed. 2. It would allow judges 3 weeks to reach what would likely be a difficult decision. Of course there would be a blog posted for about a week prior to entry period so everybody really interested would have sufficient prep time.........stan

PS I tend to agree that each month should have a different theme

author comment

your suggestions sounds good to me....are you concerned about contestants trying to copy content from other's posts?

raj (sublime_ocean)

I expect that the original writer(s) would be quick to point that out and having theft pointed out would be embarrassing enough to keep most folks from doing it....And if it IS done the thief would be barred from participating for a while...........stan

author comment

Your point is well taken. Good to know there would be a rule book..if some ignore the moral code of conduct...raj

raj (sublime_ocean)

Monthly contest, I would feel better if on the last day of each month for a while we would select around three poems, for our future.
Each two years the resulting poems can then be forwarded for publication..
By future I mean the production of a book where the royalties can go to maintain Neopoet.
This can be run along side of the stream and the workshops, each poet can vote for three poems read that month, it would provide a target of excellence for our writers, just a thought, Yours Ian.T

.
There are a million reasons to believe in yourself,
So find more reasons to believe in others..

Thanks for your thoughts. We will need as much input as possible so as to not have a repeat of the mistakes made in the Spotlight on the old site where being in the spotlight often had more to do with popularity than a poem's merit.

Now another thing will be coming up with a "prize" which won't cost the site any money. I have 2 ideas : 1. winner gets to post more than one poem per day for following month or 2. Winner's latest poem goes to top of the stream each time a member logs on (Will have to check with tech guys to see if this is doable. Now let's get some prize ideas from everybody..............stan

author comment

As usual it is late here (23-49) and here I am tapping keys and there you are with fast replies.
These things such as competitions are hard to arrange and keep track of, more value would be your second suggestion about the poem going to the top for the following month would be OK.
I feel we need a notice board where the best can be pinned and other things can be put, that are not for stream or a Blog.
Our true poetry that is of note at the moment is being lost in page after page of our stream.
The pages on Neopoet should always remain the same, this page will end up lost into many numbers as time goes by, this loses a reference point for any poem, if I had my best poem on any page it would only be that number for a day or so. I have mentioned this before here and it still remains a lost item.
I have several ways of numbering my poetry, one is the day of the year and the year like today that has just ended would be 14-030 this is the year and the day, now it is 14-031, then you carry on to Feb where the first becomes 14-032 and so on, the use of tree numbers as the 032 will allow the puter to sort in numerical order for that year.
Anyway it is now Thursday and getting late lol,
You take care out there and know we are walking the same pathway,
Yours Ian.T

.
There are a million reasons to believe in yourself,
So find more reasons to believe in others..

In the past we had comps with a theme or set structure for the poem, the poems were submitted through the month and at the end of the month each of the AEC (at that time) went to a form that marked our preferences from say 1-5(depending on how many poems were in the comp), that then was tallied and then the winner was revealed, In doing it this way there was no way of anyone voting someone in through favouritism.

I think its a great idea to bring it back they were always friendly in nature and the quality of the poetry was amazing everyone upped their game so to speak

just my thoughts

love JC xxx

“The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.” — W.B. Yeats

The good thing about having fossils like you around (just kidding) is that they have experience from the old site that comparative newbies like myself lack. I like the idea of having each poem rated on a scale because that would make the judging more precise. Not too sure I like the judges being AC members though. There are too many times when something comes up which soaks up Ac members' time and it would be about par for it to happen in midst of judging.

Still awaiting ideas for what the prize for winning should be............stan

author comment

haha I am a fossil around here :) In the past sometimes members donated prizes for the comps there was one I can clearly remember there were pens or a pen donated and won by Kelsey I think it was, you could float the idea with the general community and se what feedback you get, Another idea that floated around at one time was one big comp a year and the prize was a premium membership it never went anywhere as the site crashed around the same time.

the judges usually read the poems as they were submitted, well that's what I did, then when it was time to vote it wasn't such a time consuming task, When voting I found it easy to scan over each poem give them points in my head for merit etc. and I gave then the scoring system I outlined above, it wasn't too difficult it was actually one of the good parts of the job for me LOL No dealing with 'issues' haha

Love JC xxx

“The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.” — W.B. Yeats

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